New Handbook for Book Collectors and the Book Trade

Spencer W Stuart, Collections Advisor, is pleased to announce the publication of Contemporary Issues in Rare Book & Manuscript Collecting to be published January 2023.

Historically collecting has been a cultural practice reserved for a select few with considerable financial resources. The emerging Networked collecting ecosystem challenges this portrait as well as redefines the fundamental motivations that compel one to collect.

Contemporary Issues provides collectors and those in the Trade with detailed examinations of the economics of the structural transformations currently taking place in the world-wide market for rare books, manuscripts, prints and photographs. It examines the specific cultural transformations within the collecting ecosystem and discusses the broader social impacts of collecting in society as a whole.

To read an excerpt and pre-order the book, please head to Spencer’s website. For booksellers, the ISBN is 978-1-7387120-0-7. For any PR enquiries, please contact spencerwstuart@gmail.com, or call 604 363 1012.
Now accepting pre-orders.

ABOUT SPENCER W STUART
Spencer W. Stuart is an experienced Collections Advisor. He works with new, expanding, mature and de-accessioning collections throughout the world both in private and institutional contexts. Spencer’s work is focused on aiding to facilitate collection development, cataloguing and deacquisition strategies.

In tandem with his advisory work, Spencer has delivered 20+ sessions on collecting management to more than 500 collectors from 12 collecting organizations. His articles have appeared through Rare Book Hub, The Book Collector, Amphora and Manuscripts. He also occasionally appears on CBC Radio to present segments on Book History. Spencer holds a master’s degree in the History of Art from the Courtauld Institute in London, England (recipient of the Director’s Award). Upon graduation he took a position with Bonhams Auctioneers where he worked closely with the North American Rare Books and Manuscripts department in Toronto and New York.

He is an alumnus of the Colorado Antiquarian Book Seminars and has completed course work through the Rare Book School (University of Virginia).